EARTHQUAKE IN INDIA: RESPONSE IN THE U.S.

EARTHQUAKE IN INDIA: RESPONSE IN THE U.S.; Indian-Americans Mobilize to Send Aid Home

By SOMINI SENGUPTA

Published: January 29, 2001

The diaspora kicked into high gear over the weekend, as Indian-Americans, reeling from the shock of calamity back home, scrambled to deliver relief to the earthquake-ravaged western Indian state of Gujarat.

In Atlanta yesterday afternoon, Indian motel operators, a vast majority of whom are natives of Gujarat, took up a collection at a Super Bowl party. Indian doctors from coast to coast prepared to dispatch bandages and antibiotics on an Air India flight this evening, and a dozen trauma specialists signed up to board a plane as soon as the Indian government told them where they were needed.

In Flushing, Queens, and Edison, New Jersey, as well as in cities across Europe and Africa, worshipers at temples of the Swami Narayan, a predominantly Gujarati Hindu sect, contacted their sister temples in Gujarat to send dollars and procure news of missing relatives.

''Money is the only way we can help at the moment,'' said an exhausted and anxious Rajesh Dave, a worshiper at the Flushing temple who had as yet heard no news of his grandfather and uncle in Bhuj, a desert town of 150,000 where the quake hit hardest.

Most people with relatives in the earthquake zone are sending money either directly to their kin or through an array of Gujarati civic and religious organizations.

It is a mixed blessing, in this instance perhaps, that Gujarat, among the most populous states in India, has exported scores of its native sons and daughters abroad. Gujaratis have lived in East and South Africa for generations. They have migrated to Great Britain and Canada.

In this country, though there are no reliable numbers, Gujaratis are widely believed to be among the largest groups of Indians. A famously enterprising bunch, they are best known for running motels from the Oregon coast to the Mississippi Delta. With much of the world's diamonds cut and polished in the villages of Gujarat, a less visible niche here is the small but affluent clutch of Gujarati diamond merchants in midtown Manhattan.

While the Gujaratis in this country are most directly affected by the quake on Friday, Indians of many backgrounds, as well as Americans moved by the news of the quake, have burned up the phone lines to the Indian consulate, Consul General Shashi Tripathi said yesterday afternoon.

''A tragedy like this binds the diaspora in their grief,'' she said. ''They have the urge to do something, anything, especially because they are so far away.''

But the urge to do something is not always helpful, Indian government officials and relief workers point out. What the quake victims do not need, Mrs. Tripathi said, for instance, are clothes, whose style and size can be wholly inappropriate. (In previous calamities, donations of miniskirts and spandex tights, for instance, have gone to waste.)

What they do need, she said, are mobile surgery units to treat the wounded, along with simple medicines, bandages and splints. With telephone lines downed, cellular phones are in high demand. And among the high ticket items, according to Indian consular officials, is electronic equipment that can help search for bodies buried in rubble.

InterAction, a coalition group that is coordinating relief efforts by more than a dozen aid agencies, recommends cash donations to its approved organizations. ''The best and most versatile form of assistance to victims of war or a natural disaster is a cash donation,'' its Guide to Appropriate Giving and Donations reads. ''Goods should not be collected or sent unless they have been requested by the disaster-stricken country or experienced private voluntary organizations.''

For Dayanand Naik, a Scarsdale cardiologist and president of the American Association of Physicians from India, part of the frustration has been in not knowing exactly how to help. In his case, money is no obstacle. With a $1.5 million annual budget and a membership roster of 35,000 doctors, Dr. Naik said yesterday, the group is prepared to send 10 to 15 trauma surgeons to India immediately, as well as $50,000 in cash.

The group has made the offer to the International Red Cross, as well as to the Indian Consulate, but has not yet had an answer. ''We're kind of confused about whether our going will be of help or not,'' Dr. Naik said.

The Asian-American Hotel Owners Association, a trade group representing 7,000 Indian motel owners, a vast majority of them Gujaratis, has sent an appeal to its members to contribute directly to the American Red Cross.

News of the earthquake has jolted the members of the association, nearly three-fourths of whom trace their roots to Gujarat, said C. K. Patel, an executive board member of the group who owns a chain of 11 motels in Georgia, Tennessee and South Carolina. He said he sent a $1,000 check himself to the Red Cross. Yesterday afternoon, he was taking up a collection at a Gujarati Super Bowl party in Atlanta.